Wanderlust

Gabrielle Thibault should be here with us right now. I hope wherever she is tonight, there are rocks falling, and on her personally. I know my father voted against Lady Leffoy closing the school and now here we are. He should be here too. Joe is actually being responsible, I suppose that's one good thing to come out of this; I keep pinching myself to make sure that I'm not dreaming that.

Martial Casaubon and Ambrose Lovelace and about half the Avalon first-years are talking to the Canadian kid in St Hilda's, which is weird, because they're not friends with him. I think Mercuria Casaubon talked to him a few times in the library, but he's younger than us and older than them. Florian is with them. Charis isn't paying attention and who can blame her, she's got to ride herd on Jenny Wyngarde and Dinah Zeller and Maeve Pritchard and Patty Rosier, which is like herding cats with venomous stingers. But I'm going to go find out what that's all about.

Also, if I were Annie Loveday, I wouldn't trust Mathers with my sister's welfare. Not now that she's getting engaged to Florrie anyway. But Annie Loveday has always been a huge dope.

Absolutely dreadful things are happening to absolutely everyone, which doesn't help the fact that this weekend feels like a conspiracy to keep me as bored as a piece of wood.

I'm stuck here at school while almost everyone else I care about gets to go to Marco's wedding (and Alessio's, which I rather hope doesn't happen), except for Lew and Ari, because their mother is as good at hacking off Lady Leffoy as my dad is. Alden and Dani and Tirtzah are going home for Rosh Hoshanah, and there aren't any tryouts for sport, and so everything I could have been doing this weekend that isn't studying has more or less gone up in smoke.

Oh, yes: and if I try to find my own fun, I'll get in heaps of trouble for going off alone. The forest is as always off limits, and I might get killed by whatever is going around killing everyone else, if things weren't grim enough.

I can't imagine how anyone thought Jeannot ended her own life. Dotty she may have been, but seriously distracted people, while possibly more accident prone, are not prone to being desperate to end it all.

Oh, and the homunculi are on strike. I don't blame them, given the state of the dormitories.

I never knew things could be utterly grim and completely boring at the same time. I think I'm going to see if I can find something interesting in the library.

Living in the dungeons is certainly going to be interesting, especially when one considers the habits of the average Pelbian versus those of the average Avalonian. I at least keep my clutter in my trunk, and while I understand one's mind being distracted by higher things, at the point when your alchemy notes are smudged with mould from the ham sandwich you smuggled up to the Commons, you really need to start considering a dustbin. Possibly for the entirety of your possessions.

I saw the look on Charis' face this morning. This is not going well and it's only the first day. And Wurfel and Dee are unlikely to do anything about it at all. I swear of them all only Goldstein is competent.

At least I'll be able to keep an eye on Florrie. I don't normally get involved in younger children's fights, but I heard it was three on one--Pendry, no shock there, and Marvell, the ungrateful brat, and some new kid named Oldman. With those odds? Someone would have got a right punch in the face, no lie.

Here's hoping we have a decent year. Here's also hoping the rest of Pelby doesn't provoke the Avalonians enough to make the entire experience completely unbearable, and hoping the Avalonians don't ruin every bit of possible fun for the rest of us in revenge. Which they are very, very good at, even if Joe isn't.

Well, now I know what that was all about. And Florian looked smashing riding in the rade; the whole affair was brilliant! I should be mortified for whooping like a Red Indian, but I couldn't help it.

I am so excited about tomorrow that I can hardly sleep, not that I sleep much anyway. I hope I see Lew and Bobby there.

What a night. Something very awful happened, but Lew and I never managed to find it. Even though we both know the Bois quite well, apparently we were irrelevant, for we got turned around on a rather merry chase. I thought I was going to have to cut my hair to get all of the twigs and thorns out! Lew's looked almost like he'd been crowned, which might have been funny any other night. We were both utterly drenched; I ruined one of my best cloaks, but I've practically outgrown it anyway. I hope that Lew isn't terribly angry with me.

My parents certainly are! I'm not likely to be allowed off the grounds before September. Joe is having a grand old time of it because for once it isn't him who's in trouble. I'm not surprised they're angry, as we were scratched bloody and covered in burrs, thorns and mud. Something ran out of my sleeve just before we got inside. We must have scared them something fierce! I admitted it was all my idea, so hopefully Lew got off lightly. But it was awful; Lew’s mother was bleeding, and everyone looked perfectly terrible. We saw some of the procession on the way back. Nick Goyle is annoyed that we didn’t ask him to go, but I don’t think he’d have wanted to see his mum in the state she was in.

I would face a thousand thrashings and lectures and punishments if I could spare Florian whatever caused the look that was on his face.

Of course no one can be arsed to explain what's going on around here, but we're going to Trevena for Lammas. Never mind that we haven't gone in years. We're going now. Nice of my parents to explain. Nice of Joe to be so co-operative, too. Bloody brilliant.

At least I will get to see Florian. I like him, even if Joe doesn't, much.

Joe just can't handle it that an eleven-year-old is smarter than he is. Not that he'd ever consider doing anything constructive about it, like studying.

I want to see how Florrie's wolf is doing. I've always been partial to wolves.

Jamie went back to the war today and there was a ceilidh last night. I wasn't going to go, because the Lady Lord Leffoy's funeral was only a few days before, but Seanan and Keresek both insisted I had to, and they both have the Sight. Keresek even went up there himself, and he took Moruith, who isn't normally allowed to go Outside.

So we went.

And Ealadain came down from the mists, and he brought his sister, too. Nobody was prepared for them, even though Seanan had seen them coming. How many times does Seanan have to predict improbable things before people learn that she's always going to be right? The little sister didn't even give us a name to call her by. But she did give Jamie her blessing.

Joe fell in love with Ealadain because Joe is an idiot because he was so beautiful; Ealadain and his sister led the dance, Ealadain with Bobby and his sister with Jamie. Ealadain didn't even look back at Joe, because he's a prince on the other side of the mists, and even if he weren't he could still do better than Joe. Keresek actually laughed about it. Tristan and Alexiel and Nick and I had a laugh about it ourselves. I wouldn't laugh at something like that, except that Joe will fall in love with someone else next week and Ealadain can have anyone. Of course Tristan and Alexiel have no business laughing at people who pine, and if I were as nice as I pretend to be I'd pound the truth into their hard heads.

Bobby asked after Lew, but their mother wouldn't let them come, even though nobody really believes she's in mourning. Jamie asked after Arianwen, and Bella of course; we had all hoped that Bella would be there, but I wasn't surprised that she wasn't allowed. (As much as I love Florian I can't feel guilty about supporting Jamie. Florian talks about Bella like he thinks she's his sister, and not at all like he's in love--which is hardly surprising.)

I was surprised to hear that Bella hasn't written to Jamie! I was never surprised that she didn't write to me because we were never close; but she hasn't written to Arianwen, nor even to Livy Goulston--we talked about it at the funeral. Lady Dracaena would have done something, of course, but whether or not she's actually dead, she's beyond helping now. And Lady Gabrielle is worse than useless.